Escale à Portofino

Dior launched Escale à Portofino in 2008. The house presents it as the first chapter of a new fragrant odyssey, a getaway to Italian soil; in the spring, Now Smell This announced it as the first in a yearly series of cruise collections, all presented in a shared bottle.

A small port on the Riviera

Portofino is a small fishing port on the Italian Riviera. Dior turns it into the olfactory translation of a summer escape, composed of mainly Mediterranean essences; the house counts sixteen of them, natural, of Italian and Mediterranean origin, selected for the occasion.

A more structured cologne

François Demachy, Dior’s perfumer-creator, says he wanted a fresh fragrance with a more structured frame than a cologne. Osmoz sees it as a reinterpretation of the classic eau de Cologne, with slightly more feminine accents. For the perfumer, travel also means seeking out raw materials and keeping ongoing relationships with local growers.

A collection of escales

Escale à Portofino paved the way for other escales: Pondichéry in 2009, the Marquises, Parati in 2012. At launch, its distribution was very limited, with a single point of sale in the United States according to Now Smell This, before widening. Dior now lists it among its women’s fragrances.